More than 100 children weren given for adoption to military or police couples during this period.

The theft of children was “one of the darkest episodes in Argentina’s history,” said federal prosecutor Federico Delgado, according to The Telegraph.

The case opened 14 years ago at the request of the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, a leading human rights group, and it may take up to a year to hear testimony from about 370 witnesses.

Videla, 85, has been sentenced to life in prison, and Bignone, 83, is serving a 25-year term for other crimes committed during the 1976-1983 dictatorship. There are 13,000 people on the official list of those killed, although rights groups estimate as many as 30,000 died.

“This trial is necessary to set things straight,” said Leonardo Fossati, whose mother was three months pregnant when she was kidnapped in 1977. “For a long time now, they have denied there was a systematic plan to steal babies.”

Three weeks after the Haitian government gave a diplomatic passport to Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the country’s exiled former president, his planned return appears to have stalled amid unresolved security and logistical concerns.

Puerto Rico’s unemployment rate rose to 15.7 percent in January, up from 14.7 percent the previous month, according to figures released Monday by the Department of Labor and Human Resources.